DOVER, Del. (AP) - U.S. food giant Dole and Dow Chemical Co. are asking Delaware's Supreme Court to dismiss a lawsuit involving a now-banned pesticide linked to sterility.
Attorneys for Dole and Dow argued Wednesday that a lawsuit filed in 2011 by a former banana plantation worker in Costa Rica was barred by the passage of time. The Delaware lawsuit was filed by Jose Rufino Canales Blanco after a Texas judge in 2010 refused to certify a class-action in litigation that began there in 1993.
Dow and Dole argue that the two-year period for filing a lawsuit in Delaware was triggered by a 1995 ruling dismissing the Texas case, which was later resurrected.
But a Delaware judge ruled last year that the two-year clock did not begin ticking until the 2010 decision.
